I want to speak to my community. More importantly, I want to support the youth in every community and encourage them to stand with the young survivors of the Parkland Florida shootings.

I lost my son Johnny Ray Johnson in the shootings that occurred on August 19, 2015, outside of the Boys and Girls Club in Rochester. One of the guns used on that fateful evening was an AK-47 assault rifle.

If I could speak to the survivors in Florida, my message would be: Stand your ground and accept only the total elimination and banning of these killing machines in our communities.

The politicians are allowing your voice because they feel the breath of change blowing in regard to your rights and just cause. I believe in the change you desire for the youth of all our communities. The young need to have a chance to grow and age in our cities and suburbs.

The foolishness of the politicians and special interest groups, and the arrogance and blind ambition of the 45th President of the United States — based on obtaining power and greed — will rob children in every community of their chance to mature.

These shootings might still have happened without assault weapons, but the elimination of these guns would have resulted in fewer lives lost each time these homicides occur. The young still hold the theme “Yes We Can.” They not only can, but they will bring the change that is needed.

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Johnny Ray Johnson's mother, Lentory Johnson, lays her hand on her son's casket as she talks about his life during a celebration of life service at Ebenezer Baptist Church on Aug. 27, 2015. "He wasn't perfect, but he was mine," she said.
LAUREN PETRACCA/@LaurenPetracca/, STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER

Johnny Ray Johnson's mother, Lentory Johnson, is supported by Kilo Parker, Samaria Hossain, and MarKisha Chess as she cries out during a song at a celebration of life service for her son at Ebenezer Baptist Church on Aug. 27, 2015.
LAUREN PETRACCA/@LaurenPetracca/, STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER

Parents and all citizens of these United States, please support the young in having a future. I endure because God allows me to after the loss of my son J.R.

No parent should have to bury a child. It is especially difficult because not only are their lives being robbed from them, but their deaths could well have been prevented.

The young people in this recent shooting are not open to excuses from politicians and others, and I say good for them. They not only survived that horrific assault, they documented and shared with the world the horror of it. Nothing about these deaths should be minimized and I applaud them for not allowing this — like so many of these events — to be put aside. Thank you.

Lentory Johnson of Rochester is the mother of Johnny Johnson, a 25-year-old who was among three people killed and four injured outside of the Boys & Girls Club in 2015.

Florida's governor is proposing a three-point plan to prevent gun violence that includes banning the sale of firearms to anyone younger than 21 in the wake of last week's school massacre in Parkland, Fla.
AP